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Saturday, February 5, 2011

Failures of multiculturalism, Philby, Burgess, Blunt, and Maclean?



David Cameron today, in Germany of all places and on the same day as a march by the “English Defence League”, has criticised multiculturalism in the UK.

The speech in which Cameron made these remarks was the 47th Munich Security Conference. By making these remarks in this context Cameron is flagging up that the British Government believes that multiculturalism is a threat to national security.

There seems to be a rather large hole in David Cameron’s reasoning. He seems to believe that people steeped in the culture of a strong “British” national identity will be less likely to take up arms against the UK.

Perhaps Cameron should consider the KGB spies Philby, Burgess, Blunt, and Maclean. Cameron ought to be able to identify with these home grown extremists given that some share his type of educational background of prep School, Private School and elite University.

Given these KGB spies lived their formative years in a UK that certainly was not pursuing a policy of “state multiculturalism” and the fact that one would not consider any of these men to be of a cultural minority it is difficult to see how their recruitment by a foreign agency could have been prevented by “muscular liberalism”.

Class, religion and ethnicity is what makes this current crop of extremists different from the Cambridge 5 but in many respects they share the same aim.

The Cambridge 5 may not have been prepared to blow themselves up but they placed the security of the UK at unprecedented risk and the information they passed to the Soviets undoubtedly cost the lives of many.

It seems, rather like white collar crime, white collar home grown extremists just don’t get the same attention as blue collar home grown extremists.


  1. Polybore is perhaps being a "Liberal Extremist" by insisting that the latest crop of religious terrorists are being discriminated against on the basis of class.

    By switching loyalty to another country, one could say that Philby was the apotheosis of multiculturism, as opposed to the chaps who come to the UK and hate it.

  2. Philby could be described as a chap who came to the UK and hated it, or at least believed it to be morally deficient when compared to the USSR, as he was born in India.

    Polybore is more pointing out how home grown enemies of the state are not particular to ethnicity or religion. In terms of "white collar/ blue collar" polybore is making a comparison of how crimes descibed that way are perceived to be treated rather than class and anti UK activity persay.

  3. Disagree with Cameron: his assertion that muslim youths are turning to extremism because of a lack of a strong British identity to aspire to is bullshit. The bombing and invading of their region has more to do with that.

    The idea of imposing someone's idea of "Britishness" on incomers is total nonsense: I'd hate it if anyone tried to do that to me!

    Agree with Cameron: Multiculturalism has failed if incomers create enclaves and do not integrate. If I moved to Spain for the sun and lower cost of living, befriended only expat Brits, insisted on fish and chips and bellowed in English all the time, I might expect to be resented.


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